Information on length of stay is key to understanding the justice system’s handling of juveniles in residential placement. Developing information on the length of time juveniles spend in residential placement, however, is a difficult task. Ideally, length of stay would be calculated for each individual juvenile by combining their days of stay in residential placement from their first admission to their last release relating to a particular case. These individual lengths of placement would then be averaged for different release cohorts of juveniles. The Census of Juveniles in Residential Placement captures information on the number of days since admission to a particular facility for each juvenile in residential placement. These data represent the number of days the juvenile had been in the facility up to the reference date of the census. Because the data are not based on a release cohort, however, complete lengths of stay cannot be determined. The data reflect only a juvenile’s placement at one facility and not multiple placements in multiple facilities. The data provide an overall profile of the time juveniles had been in the facility at the time of the census—a 1-day snapshot of time spent in the facility.

In 2011, at the time of the census, residents had been in the facility an average of 122 days since their admission. A few residents for whom very long stays were reported, however, skew this average (mean). In fact, half of all residents had been in placement fewer than 65 days (median).

Residents’ time in the facility varied by their placement status. Half of committed residents had been in placement longer than 103 days. Time in placement for detained juveniles was substantially shorter than for committed juveniles. Half of all detained juveniles had been in placement fewer than 15 days.

Time in placement was also related to whether juveniles were held in a public or private facility. In public facilities, half of committed juveniles had been in placement longer than 97 days. In private facilities, half of committed juveniles had been in the facility longer than 111 days. Among the detained population: in 2011, juveniles detained in private facilities had been in the facility for somewhat longer durations than those detained in public facilities. Half of those detained in public facilities had been in placement fewer than 15 days. Half of youth detained in private facilities had been in placement fewer than 19 days.